Synopsis: Pg1-pg23
Jeff Haight looks over some of Peter Parker’s front page Bugle photographs, then runs into Pete. After a chat, Jeff hears that Dr. Octopus is robbing the museum so he heads over to take some pictures. Meanwhile, Pete makes his way over and takes care of it as Spider-Man. By the time Jeff makes it back to the Bugle, Jameson tells him that he’s already bought pictures from Parker. The next day, Dr. Octopus is seen in prison.

References:
Peter is said to not be out of college yet, so sometime before ASM 185.

Synopsis: Pg1-pg21
Dr. Octopus puts a plan together in prison, involving Jeff Haight. Meanwhile, Jeff spies on a date between Peter and Mary Jane. They both separately hear of a fracas involving the Vulture and head off. After the fight Jeff heads back to the Bugle where Robbie tells him they already bought pictures from Peter. That night, Jeff visits Dr. Octopus in prison.

References:
Peter and Mary Jane are dating, and given this has to be before ASM 185, it’s now narrowed down to between ASM 143 & ASM 182.

Synopsis: Pg1-pg2-FB: about a year ago
Dr. Octopus fights the National Guard as he tries to steal some plutonium. Pg3-pg22
Jeff and Dr. Octopus chat. The next day Jeff stumbles across Spider-Man and Mysterio fighting. Afterwards, he goes back to Dr. Octopus where they put together a plan to get his arms released.

Synopsis: Pg1-FB
Dr. Octopus uses his arms in his lab, very early in his career. Pg2-pg22
Jeff releases Dr. Octopus’ arms. As they make their way across town, Peter excuses himself from Aunt May and goes to fight them. The arms defeat Spider-Man and meet with Dr. Octopus.

References:
Dr. Octopus is using the manual controls for his arms in the FlashBack, and he’s in his green jumpsuit.

Synopsis: Pg1-pg23
Spider-Man beats up Dr. Octopus. Jeff is thrown in jail, but he finally gets a photo of his on the front page. Dr. Octopus is also thrown in prison.

References:
So, after ASM 143 & before ASM 182 for Spider-Man and Mary Jane. This has to be after ASM 159 for Dr. Octopus, as he’s tied up between ASM 131 & ASM 152, thanks to ASM 157-FB. That wouldn’t stop him from trying to steal some plutonium, though…

paul b., what dates do you have for the time period around asm 170 and the flashback placement around asm 152? what about spidey's next appearance, in m/tu@ 1? i just got through reading this series and i think i might have some slightly different placement suggestions (i'm still trying to work out the details). i think your dates might help me.

paul b., what dates do you have for the time period around asm 170 and the flashback placement around asm 152? what about spidey's next appearance, in m/tu@ 1?

I have ASM 152 in early April of Peter Parker's fifth undergraduate year of college (Year 9). ASM 170 is in early January of Peter's final undergraduate year of college (Year 10). M/TU@ 1 occurs a little later that January.

One of the biggest problems I see with the placement above is that issues #2-5 clearly have very warm weather. In issue #2, for example, MJ is shown in a tanktop and shorts, many others are in summery clothes, and the fountain in Washington Square Park is on. The same holds true through to #5. By contrast, #1 shows Pete wearing a hooded sweatshirt over a t-shirt, a number of museum patrons wearing jackets, and most people out in the street in jackets, long-sleeve shirts, and sweaters. Nobody is wearing shorts that I can see.

This difference led me to suspect that some time had passed between #1 and #2, and this is supported by a few things:

- in #2 a reference is made to Ock being moved for harming another prisoner, indicating that he hasn't just arrived

- in #2, Ock receives Haight's photo book - something that presumably wasn't already at Riker's and would also
presumably take some time to get

- in #2, when he gives Ock that photo book, Vernon has to ask/clarify that Haight is the guy who was there at the fight with Spider-Man, possibly indicating that enough time has passed since the initial conversation about it (in #1) for Vernon to get foggy on the details

- in #2, Anna says to Haight: "you're not still upset the bugle didn't run your pictures of doc ock are you?", possibly implying that it's been awhile since this happened and that she might think enough time has passed for him to get over it

- in #2, Haight says to a cop at the hostage scene: "Charlie, it's me. I gave you those Knicks tickets at the Met last--" and he's then cut off by the cop. This indicates to me that Brian K. Vaughan, rather than just having him finish "last night", wanted to leave the amount of time between issues 1 and 2 indeterminate. It could be "last week", "last month", etc.

- in #3, Ock says "you have no idea how much comfort these photographs have given me during my unfortunate incarceration", implying that he's been incarcerated for some non-trivial length of time

- in #4, Pete needs an excuse to get away from Aunt May and says: "I forgot to drop off my class choices with the office registrar." If we're assuming there's a grain of truth there, and that he's talking about summer classes, it makes more sense for him to need to do this in early spring rather than January

Some of these are small and could be seen as insignificant by themselves, but I think it all adds up to there being some time between the first two issues. I would suggest that issues 2-5 occur between M/TU 57 and NO 12, in early spring.

There are two small problems with this. First, Negative Exposure #1 shows some green leaves on trees outside. I think we can explain this by saying that some warm (non-freezing, but still not really warm) air came in, which melted all the snow seen in some of Spidey's last few appearances, and triggered some growth in the plants.

The second problem is that in #3, when fighting Mysterio, Spidey says "first it was Doc Ock and then the Vulture. You're like celebrity deaths, you always come in threes". This is more problematic, as it really seems like he means they've all come one after the other. My take would be to assume he's talking about public disturbances in Manhattan, as all his intervening battles have either been more private affairs (Electro & Blizzard blackmailing the Bugle, Morbius/Empathoid attacking Spidey) or outside of the city (in New Mexico and on the moon, specifically).

Flashback:

I don't think there's anything wrong with where Col_Fury has Ock's flashback from "about a year ago", but if we move it slightly we could have an elegant explanation for the modern costume seen both in the main story and this flashback.

At the end of ASM 159 Ock is free. If we say the flashback occurs almost immediately after that, it's about 8 months before Haight's "about a year ago" comment. This isn't the best approximation of a year, but since Ock isn't seen between ASM 159 and Negative Exposure 1, it allows to say that he's trying out a new costume for those 8 months, explaining the new duds.

We know the book isn't trying to pretend the classic duds don't exist, because there's another flashback (in #4) to Ock's early career that shows them. Also, in #5 Spidey says to Ock "your new look is actually worse than your old...bowl-cut-and-jumpsuit ensemble" -- he's not only acknowledging that it is a different outfit, but also that it's new since the last time they met (ASM 159).

Anyway, with this flashback placement we don't have to assume an art/editorial "error", or assume Ock switching back and forth between costumes.

For my own reading, I had placed the first Superman/Spider-Man adventure immediately following ASM 170 because it was the first largish break in the first MU winter following its publication. Upon reading Negative Exposure 1, I was struck that at basically the exact same time, Doc Ock was robbing the Metropolitan Museum of art in both issues. As Haight says in Negative Exposure 1, it's "weird, Ock's crimes are usually science-related." Could this not be a coincidence? Is Ock's robbery in Negative Exposure 1 maybe the non-merged universe equivalent event of the robbery in Superman vs the Amazing Spider-Man?

Also, some people in the forum archives were thrown by the comment about Peter being seen with a blonde. I think with these placements the blonde was probably Liz Allen, and Pete was probably helping her with wedding preparations, just as MJ had been doing a few issues earlier (I can't remember which one specifically).